RANCHO MURIETA, CA (MPG) - After being left out of discussions for years, Rancho Murieta residents will finally have the opportunity to weigh in on a proposal to automate two remote gates, allowing them to automatically open, in addition to the two main gates, during emergency evacuations.

This opportunity will be part of a town hall meeting hosted by Sacramento County Supervisor Sue Frost at the RMA Building on Nov. 16 at 10 a.m. Frost will begin the session by discussing county initiatives and introducing her successor, Rosario Rodriguez.

During the second hour of the town hall, Frost has invited Greg Pryor, president of the Rancho Murieta Regional Fire Safe Council, to present the case for automating the Escuela Gate on the north side and the two Bent Grass Court gates on the south side of the community. If an evacuation is required, the incident commander or their designee would remotely open the gates using a cell phone, with a code stored at the interagency fire dispatch center, according to the fire safe council’s proposal.

Although including gate automation in the 2022 budget, the Rancho Murieta Association didn’t follow through and denied further requests, citing safety concerns. The RMA Board believes that the remote gates shouldn’t be opened until a first responder is on site to manage traffic.

At press time, it was unconfirmed whether RMA representatives would be at the town hall.

Opposing views

Pryor and the RMA representatives elaborated on their positions in recent interviews.

Pryor argued that RMA could be held liable if the remote gates aren’t opened immediately. “In my 49 years in fire and rescue, assigning first responders to locate gates they are not aware of an unlocking them with a key creates a huge potential for delay and lives lost,” he said. That  is an unacceptable risk.”

In contrast, RMA general manager Rod Hart emphasized the board’s priority on community health and safety. “Without some safeguards there, you could destroy the entire exit,” he stated. “All it takes is one scared person who doesn’t see the truck that is going 75 mph (and crashes). Now the first responders can’t get in, and the evacuees can’t get out.”

The upcoming presentation on remote gate automation follows an online workshop organized by Sacramento County Supervisor Sue Frost on Sept. 16. Attendees included Adam House, chief of the Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District, other Sac Metro Fire officials, Assistant Sheriff Matt Peterson, MaryJo Flynn, Chief of the Sacramento Office of Emergency Services, high-ranking representatives from county planning, the department of transportation, the county counsel’s office, Pryor and other members of the fire safe council, as well as RMA representatives Hart and board member Patrick O’Hern. Although invited, Brian Maynard, Commander of the California Highway Patrol’s east Sacramento office, did not attend. 

The River Valley Times was not invited. However, Denisa Martian, Frost’s chief of staff, prepared 11 pages of meeting minutes, which she made available one month after the meeting. Martian has offered to email a copy to any resident who requests them at [email protected].

Stakeholder meeting

Frost began the meeting by emphasizing the importance of addressing the remote gates as a critical component of Rancho Murieta’s emergency evacuation plan, noting they hadn’t yet been adequately resolved. “The goal is to adequately articulate the problem and then have the conversation on how to resolve it and get the work agreed on and completed,” she said.

 Frost added, “If people cannot get out of the gates fast enough, the state and county roads being studied and upgraded may not matter.”

Pryor highlighted the urgency of the situation, explaining that a wildland fire driven by 30-MPH wind gusts could quickly spread embers into the community, causing a structure-to-structure fire that could move from north to south within 30 to 60 minutes.

Traffic engineer John Long added, that even under ideal conditions, evacuating from the gates would take an hour and a half or longer to evacuate with emergency conditions likely extending that time significantly. 

Pryor also noted that although RMA and Sac Metro agreed to install Knox locks on the gates as an interim solution in 2021, these were intended only to provide entry for fire trucks, not for evacuation. Relying on a first responder to unlock the gates could take five to 20 minutes or more, adding to potential delays.

Transportation representative Cameron Shew reported that obtaining a permit for Stonehouse Road to allow an incident commander to open Escuela Gate in an emergency would be straightforward. Caltrans confirmed that the Bent Grass Court gates are not in the state’s right of way, allowing for immediate automation for emergency evacuation purposes.

RMA General Manager Rod Hart emphasized the board’s stance that a first responder should be present before opening the gates.

Pryor countered that leaving the gates closed posed a greater risk than a potential accident. According to the meeting minutes, automation would enable immediate gate opening upon the incident commander’s request.

RMA Director Patrick O’Hern, with 25 years of law enforcement experience primarily in traffic, expressed concerns about potential bottlenecks, foreseeing congestion if residents were entering and exiting through the gate within a short period. “Infrastructure work is needed for these cars to have a way out,” he noted.

Hart clarified that funding was not a barrier. “The board feels no automation is best,” he stated. “Some board members are concerned about traffic safety associated with automated gates and the absence of a person to manage traffic.”

Sac Metro Deputy Chief Adam Mitchell said automated gates wouldn’t blocked ingress and egress for emergency vehicles “and fire responders will get to intersections as soon as possible to perform traffic control.”

Frost expressed her own concerns about evacuation delays if a fire were to sweep through Rancho Murieta.  “She said she didn’t want to retire without knowing that she had done everything she could to make Rancho Murieta as safe as possible,” according to the minutes.

At the conclusion of the meeting, Frost noted that the stakeholder agencies had agreed, “It is the community that needs to put in the gates or not.” Regarding automation, she added, “It is the position of the RMRFSC (fire safe council) and Supervisor Frost that the community, RMA, is responsible for the gates.”

One point not discussed at the meeting is that residents unable to evacuate would have an alternative: sheltering in one of the community’s green belts, similar to what was done during the Santa Rosa fire. Sac Metro officials and Pryor have confirmed this option at previous meetings. “We always default to sheltering in place if evacuation is no longer a safe option,” Pryor explained.

Interviews

The River Valley Times interviewed Hart, O’Hern, and Pryor before writing this story, and John Long provided a script of his presentation at the stakeholders’ meeting. Alongside his concerns about evacuation times within the gates, Long noted that bottlenecks on Highway 16 could also impede evacuation. (Thanks to efforts by Long and Supervisor Frost, Caltrans awarded the county transportation department $400,000 to study solutions to these bottlenecks.)

Hart expressed frustration with Pryor's claim that RMA isn’t concerned about liability, stressing that, as fiduciaries to the community, they are. “The only thing that could be possibly more important than that is the health and safety of the members we serve,” he said. “Automated gates create a hazard for our members exiting on a highway that has never been exited upon before…For people pulling out on the highway, there is a very good possibility of somebody getting hit and killed or at least severely injured.'”

O’Hern pointed out that, in past emergencies, people who feel endangered tend to use both the entrance and exit lanes when driving through a gate. “So now you have completely blocked the entrance,” he said. “If some people turn left and some people right, you are going to block the highway, and that is even without an accident.”

Hart voiced concerns about the potential chaos if the gates are opened immediately without oversight. “The first responders are stuck with a mess that they can’t change,” he said.

Both Hart and O’Hern believe that any delays caused by requiring first responders to open the gates would be minimal. “If it is bad enough that we’re calling for an evacuation, the emergency response people already are on-site,” Hart noted.

Once first responders arrive in the community, their top priority would be to facilitate an orderly evacuation, O’Hern added.

Hart argued that the risk of a brief delay would be far less dangerous than a scenario where the gate either fails to open or creates a hazard that blocks traffic entirely.

Hart and O’Hern also cited factors that could prevent an automatic gate from functioning, including power outages, downed cell towers, dead batteries, or mechanical issues—none of which would be an issue with a person present to manage the gates. Hart also remarked that automatic systems could lead to a false sense of security.

Hart acknowledged the valuable contributions of the fire safe council, such as achieving the Fire Wise Community designation. (With assistance from Frost, the council also secured a $4.5 million Cal Fire grant for fuel reduction intended to prevent wildland fires from spreading into the community and was instrumental in the Caltrans grant.)

“There is a difference of opinion on how people exit out of here,” Hart said. “They would like to see it without a human element, and we contend that the safest way is for the human element to be there."

Pryor expressed frustration with the RMA stance. “It would be vastly safer to automate the gates, allowing residents to exit freely while a first responder eventually locates the gates and performs traffic control,” he said. “Keeping Rancho Murieta drivers locked in because one might have an accident is a fundamental assault on their intelligence and decision-making abilities.” 

Pryor also noted that no emergency officials raised objections after he advocated for gate automation at the stakeholder meeting, adding that gate technology is 99% reliable. He supported O’Hern’s suggestion to make infrastructure improvements at the remote gates but emphasized that these plans should not delay automation. 

“Keeping people locked in is not the way to do things,” he stated.

In closing, Pryor reiterated a point he made at the stakeholder meeting:

“While automating the gates might not be a perfect plan, it is the best damn plan we have.”